Nikki Sixx’s descent into hell, revisited

In retrospect, the success of the debut SIXX:A.M. album was the first death knell for Nikki’s then day job with Mötley Crüe. It might have been there to serve as the soundtrack to his gruelling drugs biography of the same name, but it showed a sharper, more shrewd and contemplative songwriter than people thought capable from a man who once rhymed ’fifty thousand screaming watts’ with ’honey dripping from her pot’.

Time has been kind to the songs and production too, and for this 10th Anniversary Edition the band have reworked three of the originals to offer some extra impetus for parting with your cash for an album you probably already own. That said, there’s no denying the impact and craft of songs like utterly bleak Van Nuys and the yearning imbued in Accidents Can Happen: the sound of a man clinging to sobriety by his very fingertips.